Honorary Brazilian Consulate in Seattle

Brazilian sugar mills make almost half the world’s sugar exports. The Washington Post reports that sugar millers in Brazil are urging India to end a subsidy program on expectation it will cause them to lose as much as $1 billion this year as prices decline.

India, the largest sugar producer after Brazil, is offering to subsidize 4 million metric tons of exports in the next two years and granting interest-free loans to mills to help them pay debt to growers.

Sugar, which has plunged 40 percent since early 2011, may drop between 7 percent and 12 percent on average this year because of India’s aid to producers, Leao de Sousa, executive director at Brazilian sugar industry group Unica, said by telephone.

Unica is in talks with Brazil’s government to seek to build a case against the subsidies at the World Trade Organization, Sousa said after Unica posted a joint statement with Australian producers urging the end of India’s program.

“It’s a very worrisome situation because the sugar industry already faces a delicate moment in Brazil due to low sugar prices,” Sousa said. “We’re working to make the government aware of the extent of the problem.” Read the whole story here.